I should note that normally, this defendant would have received a trial in each of the counties. In this case, the five counties willingly opted to consolidate all the charges into one Lehigh County trial for the sake of expediency, so that they would not have to deal with five separate trials and five separate sentences and whether those sentences would run consecutively to each other or at the same time.

The New York City-based organization Food & Water Watch has also voiced opposition to the lease, and called for an independent evaluation into the city's options for resolving the pension issue. In a statement, the group said: "Leasing the water and sewer system to a private company for up to 50 years would saddle residents with increased water rates and cutbacks in service, all as municipal employees suffer job cuts. Private companies exist to generate profit for shareholders, not to provide safe, affordable services to city residents."

Please note that I personally do not remove comments from the website, so I cannot speak to the reason why any comments were removed. But I can tell you that any reader can flag a comment as inappropriate if they believe it violates the website's code of conduct. Sorry I can't be more help.

Cynthia Matt, assistant to Pastor Randy Landis at Lifechurch, issued this statement on Monday, March 26, after this story was already published:

"Lifechurch has not and will not make student referrals to Lincoln Leadership or any other school. We see that as a parental matter. Lifechurch has been a good, longstanding citizen of the City of Allentown and seeks to continue its positive relationships with the City and the community at large, including all of the schools in our area."

Thanks Elijah. What you're saying is true, although I believe Councilman O'Connell directed his request primarily toward the supporters in the room since he said there were more of them and he believed they would free up the most seats. But you're right, he was speaking about people who weren't planning to speak, and I probably could have been more clear about that in the story, so that's for bringing this to everyone's attention.

I just wanted to point out that a call was placed to Dorney Park and to their attorney in this matter. The attorney referred comment to Dorney Park, and I placed a call to their representatives, but did not get a response. I held the story one extra day to give them ample time to respond, but they did not. If they do contact me later down the road, I'd be happy to write an update with their response, but I could not hold the story up any longer. Also, the lawsuit does not specify whether the employees in question were security guards or not.

The statement above from polarbear12 is largely correct, and that statement from Melissa Jantzen has been removed from the web edition of this story. Melissa had stated that she received an emergency call saying that Ladd had to be adopted within one day or he could be euthanized. While Melissa DID receive that call, she did not know that the Center and Bull Run Rescue had, in fact, been communicating for several weeks to find a foster family for Ladd. A foster family had been lined up, but that fell through at the last moment, which is why Melissa received the last-minute emergency call.

The following correction will run in Wednesday's newspaper regarding this:

"The Center for Animal Health and Welfare and Bull Run Rescue had been in communication for several weeks to arrange a foster family for Ladd, a pit bull who is receiving rehabilitation services. Incorrect information was provided to The Express-Times for a Monday story."

There is a lengthy procedure before filing a lawsuit like this. According to the lawsuit (the link is above), Fritts filed a complain with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in February 2010. They then file a right to sue letter (which doesn't necessarily mean the EEOC and PHRC endorses the suit one way or the other) and that process usually takes longer than a year. According to the suit, Fritts received his right to know letter on August 29, 2011.

I spoke today with Michael Ivenz, who could not be reached yesterday for this story, so I wanted to include what he said here:

Ivenz said this business is not new, and he has been operating it since 1975. He did not have a business permit during that time, and appeared before the zoning hearing board last month because the township advised he needed to seek a variance.

Ivenz said he does not plan to expand so he does not anticipate creating any additional impact on the community, traffic of otherwise.

"I'm a single guy, just an owner/operator," he said. "This whole uprising creates a huge hardship on me. In these economical times, it's hard to make a living without all these delicate issues."